Wednesday, February 20, 2013

A total of 14 missile strikes, some seemingly delivered by drones and, including four, according to HRW, that “appeared to involve fixed-wing aircraft dropping aerial bombs,” have been highlighted in the investigation as being of concern. But looking at Israel’s operation as a whole, the questions still remaining over the 14 strikes -- into one of the most crowded civilian zones on the planet -- suggest that in not less than 1,486 cases Israel did seek to ensure that the overwhelming majority of targets – equating, according to HRW’s own figures, to more than 99 percent -- were indeed carefully selected. They suggest, too, that the selection of targets was to ensure there was a minimal loss of Palestinian civilian casualties.

And what’s the progress Areikat refers to? The Palestinians broke off the Taba talks, the second intifada raged on, Yasser Arafat was replaced by Mahmoud Abbas and his do-nothing doctrine. Israel withdrew from Gaza and Hamas simply took over and continued firing rockets. The PLO all but bailed out of Oslo with its unilateral statehood bid.
Progess? What progress?If Taba is good enough for the Palestinians now, why wasn’t it good enough then?

GEOGRAPHICALLY, THERE are five kinds of states: contiguous, with a homogeneous territory (such as Germany and Brazil); prolonged, with an extended territory in latitude or longitude (like Chile or Mozambique); irregular (like Greece); perforated, with sovereign states within its territory (like Italy with San Marino and South Africa with Lesotho and Swaziland); and fragmented, with a discontinuous territory interrupted by seas or by other states.
Among fragmented states are Russia (with Kaliningrad in European territory), the US (with Alaska), Denmark, Philippines and Japan (with archipelagos), Malaysia and Oman.

Douglas Murray: A model of diversity
There’s nothing quite like diversity. Take Manchester. It has a large Muslim population and a lot of gays. What could possibly go wrong?

Last week Manchester University’s Student Union played host to the ‘Global Aspirations of Women Society’. This appears to be a front group of the extremists of Hizb ut-Tahrir and therefore by no means does what it says on the tin.
Anyhow – as the university’s student newspaper puts it:‘A speaker at a Students’ Union affiliated society workshop said that homosexuals would be executed in an ideal Islamic state, describing the practice of two men kissing as an “atrocity.”
1st year Middle Eastern studies student Colin Cortbus attended a public meeting at the Students’ Union last Wednesday 13th February organised by Global Aspirations and asked the chairperson of the meeting whether “in the Islamic society in which you strive for,” they would “feel comfortable, personally and morally, to kill a gay man.”

Organised by Students For Palestine, and with the comrades from Socialist Alliance inevitably participating, here's a demo in the Melbourne suburb of Somerton on 19 February against the appearance of anti-Islamist campaigner Geert Wilders at a public meeting organised by the Q Society.

As we have noted here before, Abdel Bari Atwan – the Gaza-born editor of the London-based Arabic language newspaper ‘Al Quds Al Arabi’- is a regular guest on several BBC programmes on both radio and television, despite his frequent voicing of often frankly offensive opinions.
Readers will probably not be surprised to learn that Atwan is now promoting the notion that:“… the French military intervention in Mali is designed not only to protect its own interests in the region but to benefit Israel.”

“I am sitting in a lecture by Chuck Hagel at Rutgers,” Wagner wrote in the email. “He basically said that Israel has violated every UN resolution since 1967, that Israel has violated its agreements with the quartet, that it was risking becoming an apartheid state if it didn’t allow the Palestinians to form a state. He said that the settlements were getting close to the point where a contiguous Palestinian state would be impossible.”
“He said that he [thought] that Netanyahu was a radical and that even [former Israeli foreign minister Tzipi] Livni, who was hard nosed thought he was too radical and so wouldn’t join in a coalition [government] with him. … He said that Hamas has to be brought in to any peace negotiation,” Wagner wrote.

A pro-Hezbollah, pro-Hamas candidate for the Iranian presidency, a man linked to Iranian-controlled front groups, brought former Republican Nebraska Senator Chuck Hagel to speak at Rutgers University in 2007, according to another professor on campus.
Hooshang Amirahmadi, who led Rutgers’ Center for Middle Eastern Studies when Hagel came to campus, is the founder and president of the American-Iranian Council. He arranged for Hagel’s speech on March 2, 2007, the faculty source told The Daily Caller.

“2012 has been a year of unprecedented violence against Jews in France,” according to the report, which referenced the shooting murders of a rabbi and three Jewish children on March 19 by an Islamist radical at a Jewish school in Toulouse.

So why should I as a Jew care about the fate of Christians? Firstly, having been victims for thousands of years it is our obligation to care and reach out to victims of discrimination, religious intolerance and extremism. Secondly, it is our responsibility to stand up for religious freedom and specially for those moderate and tolerant values promoted by most of these Christian minority groups. Moreover, Christians are rediscovering their Hebraic roots and are strong supporters of Israel, as they see its rebirth as the actualization of the biblical prophesies and of their divine mission to assist with the return of Jews to their promised land.
It is incumbent on my people to ensure that at least in the area where there is Jewish suzerainty, discrimination against Christians does not occur, and I have satisfied myself that of all the countries in the Middle East, only in Israel is the Christian population growing and flourishing.
(The writer is the chairman of the South African Zionist Foundation)

American superstar Alicia Keys, one of the leading musical artists of the last 10 years, will be arriving in Israel for the first time on the birthday of her country – July 4th.
The winner of 14 Grammys will perform at the Nokia Center as part of her Set the World on Fire tour in support of her new album, Girl on Fire. Keys most recent highprofile appearances were at last month’s Super Bowl where she sang the National Anthem, and at this month’s Grammy Awards where she performed a duet with Maroon 5’s Adam Levine.

Hasbys!

Elder of Ziyon - حـكـيـم صـهـيـون

This blog may be a labor of love for me, but it takes a lot of effort, time and money. For over 14 years and 30,000 articles I have been providing accurate, original news that would have remained unnoticed. I've written hundreds of scoops and sometimes my reporting ends up making a real difference. I appreciate any donations you can give to keep this blog going.

feed

counter

Disclaimer

The opinions expressed by those providing comments on this website are theirs alone, and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Elder of Ziyon. EoZ is not responsible for the content of the comments.

You are legally liable for the content of your comments that you submit to this site.

By submitting a comment to this website, you warrant that we are not responsible, or liable of any of the content posted by you and you agree to indemnify us from any and all claims and liabilities (including legal fees) which could arise from your comments submitted to the site.